Hackers Exploit Social Networking Sites

According to Symantec report, social networking sites, blogs and other Web destinations (which depend on content generated by user) are the current targets of hackers. These ill-motivated guys are targeting them not just to display their skills but also to look for secret financial information.

In a Business Week report, Internet Security Company Symantec concludes that since social networking sites are meant to socialize and to know new people. Consequently, a level of faith is present there. So, there are more chances that users click on the links provided by hackers that can redirect the users to unknown sites that extract their private information.

These sites have been added with more interactive Web 2.0-based apps, which eventually expose users to more sophisticated exploits than the recent 'Flash-based' worm attack in a 'MySpace' that lead the user to a blog related to 9/11 conspiracy theories.

The bad guys are evolving new techniques to get people hooked, so they are tracking these grassroots-type sites, says Dave Cole of Symantec.

Till now social networking sites have been struck primarily by irritating worms, adware and phishing scams. But these sites are now vulnerable to more dangerous attacks, such as 'SQL injection', 'denial of service' or other severe ones. They could be used as platforms for more concentrated attacks on businesses and consumers' private data.

Social networking sites are always easy, handsomely rich targets, said Chris Boyd, research manager for Face Time Security Labs. In his words, "It's almost like fishing in a barrel."

The hackers and data interceptors dig into abundant personal information stocked on the networking sites to pour fraudulent activities over the unwary chatters. So far, the efforts are in limits. But now security experts believe the defrauding activities will spread and social net workers could be victims of "spear phishers". To block such security attacks; browser companies are under growing pressure to release new solutions and updates to existing versions. However, the hackers have so much financial incentives that it makes things difficult for browsers to leave the hackers behind.